The National Cybersecurity Center (CNCS) told Lusa this Wednesday that it “along with other competent national and international entities has been monitoring developments related to the use of TikTok and has made “a series of good practice recommendations”.
Given the recent decisions to withdraw the application of the social network of short videos TikTok, owned by the Chinese ByteDance, from the professional devices of its employees of the European institutions, Lusa asked the CNCS whether it is following this matter and whether it has measures taken to raise awareness.
“The CNCS, along with other competent national and international entities, is following developments on this matter, including the EU position [União Europeia] and some of its member states,” the entity said.
The “use of the ‘app’ [aplicação] concerned, as well as other social networks, carries short, medium and long term risks for the user as it offers a user experience that increasingly depends on both data access and the functionality of the devices themselves, in many cases without the user noticing “, admits the National Center for Cybersecurity.
In this connection, “The CNCS has issued a series of good practice recommendations regarding the use of social networks and provides a range of tools, including the Cibersocial Citizen course, to help you better understand social networks and their risks, as well as best practices to mitigate those risks “concludes the entity in a written response to Lusa.
Lusa again questioned the office of the Secretary of State for Digitization and Public Administration, Mário Campolargo, on the subject and position of Portugal.
Exactly the same answer was given to Lusa earlier this month, when the cabinet said that the “Government believes that promoting the safe use of digital tools in professional contexts and in public functions, both in public administration and companies, should be done by making users aware of the risks arising from the use of applications that provide a user experience that increasingly relies on access not only to data, but also to the functionalities of the devices themselves, in many cases without the user himself user realizes this”.
Therefore, Mário Campolargo’s office added, “any initiative that aims to promote the security of communications in a professional context can only be fully effective if the focus is on the user and usage behavior, and not on the equipment, service or private life”.
Lusa announced this position on March 1, the same day that the European Parliament sent an “email” to its employees asking them not to install the TikTok application on professional devices and to remove those who already use it due to security vulnerabilities until March 20 this month.
This after the European Commission announced on February 23 the suspension of this application on the professional devices of its staff, with the aim of protecting the community administrator from cybersecurity threats.
In an interview with Lusa at the end of February, TikTok’s head for Southern Europe said the European Commission’s suspension of the social network on professional devices was “a political decision that goes far beyond” respecting European rules.
Source: DN
